


how long?

by crestwood



Series: how long universe [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gay, M/M, Romance, Songfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-04
Updated: 2019-04-04
Packaged: 2020-01-04 15:49:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18346784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crestwood/pseuds/crestwood
Summary: Albus and Scorpius had all the time in the world.(Alternates between verse and prose with each successive section)





	how long?

_ we've seen those mountains kneeling, felten and grey _ _   
_ _ we thought our very hearts would up and melt away _

 

we fell together in those mountains, our first awkward embrace overseen by the snow-capped alps. his blonde hair was white in the summer, almost seeming to reflect the sunlight as it overstayed its welcome. where time flayed and bruised most things, it only nourished my impression of him. 

 

i said darling, darling dance for me, in the light you will never be judged - i wanted a clear view of him, always. entangled lovers, a thicket of limbs. an intricate cadence lives in us both, i moved as he moved, made in his image. 

 

a low hum filled my ears. i was numb to the specifics of certain moments, and so very lucid the next. 

 

though felt deeply, we struggled to understand what we had on our hands. he lingered in my lungs, as arresting as the day we met. material love could end, some things do not. 

 

we ran through the shallow waters, the surf rushing to meet the shore, hardly a worry to be found as far as eyesight stretched 

 

he filled the cracks in who i was, i did not ask much of him, only that he did not leave without warning. i was all clenched fists, bloodshot eyes, nervous glances. he was calm, level, constant. 

 

a gust of wind could have taken me at our peak, i felt lighter than i ever had 

  
  


_ i dreamed you were skipping little stones across the surface of the water _ __   
_ frowning at the angle where they were lost, and slipped under forever _ __   
_ in a mud-cloud, mica-spangled, like the sky'd been breathing on a mirror _ __   
  


I traced my fingers along his outstretched arms, my touch gifting goosebumps to the exposed skin that lay motionless across my torso. There we were, gently lifting ourselves out of the depths of the kind of sleep you have when you are content to live inside of your thoughts for as long as you can. 

 

“I dreamt of you, Scorpius.” 

 

“What of me?” His voice had yet to shake off the rasp of the morning. 

 

I recounted the shimmer of the lake, rippling under the weight of the flattest pebbles he could sift out of the soil. Scorpius showed me how to best skip them along the surface--five, six, seven times. He counted each successive attempt, in competition with himself, always. 

 

I pulled my hat lower, shielding myself from the chill. It was a bitter season and I rested easy in my assumption that we were unlikely to be interrupted. Leaves spiraled in the wind, trapped in an unending migration; I could feel how alive it all was. And then I awoke. 

  
  


_ anyhow - i sat by your side, by the water _ __   
_ you taught me the names of the stars overhead that I wrote down in my ledger _ __   
  


he had always operated on the largest scale possible and, of course, found himself particularly drawn to the constellations. he could pick them out of the night sky like old friends. soon, i could see what he saw--Vega, Capella, Saiph, Antares--and what a sight. 

 

i would switch the names around and fumble the memories left and right, but the thought was enough for him, the thought was more than enough.

 

we travelled the world, never visiting the same place twice. in new places we could let our guard down; we could be other people. we walked hand in hand through the streets, feeling as ordinary as we ever had in our lives. i wanted to disappear into this new role--i’d been acting my whole life, what harm could another performance bring?

 

as it was, we eventually made our way back to our own lives. i could not be said to prefer them. still, we found pockets of time to slip away, out of spaces we’d known. these were the days that lived on. 

 

in the hills we could see the world for miles, in all directions. birds swept in and out of the area, rising and falling with the air’s current. the simplicity of the landscape was its very draw, each tract of land a replica of its surroundings. we did not care where we were. 

 

i felt tall in his presence. he lifted me up, always.

  
  


_ though all i knew of the rote universe were those pleiades loosed in december _ _   
_ _ i promised you I'd set them to verse so i'd always remember _

 

I transcribed his teachings as best I could. There were thousands of notes that I’d scribbled and the work to condense them was arduous. (do I cut away Alnitak? Could I fit Nekkar in with the rest?) His birthday fast approached and I had only the scraps of an idea pieced together haphazardly. 

 

All night I worked, for a week straight; hardly a break to eat and drink. Who’d known that the most thoughtful gifts demanded such consideration? I hadn’t made things easy on myself, admittedly, consumed as I’d allowed myself to become. My deliberate phrasing was born of an obsession with finding the balance between what I wanted to say and what I wanted him to understand. 

 

The final product filled me with a pride I’d not known. Joy in the form of melody, a genuine monument to my dedication to his talents, interest and being. I could sing it a hundred times over and never tire. I hummed it when we could not be together, always. 

 

_ “the sky it is full of the stars that assume their place in our universe  _

_ i see them as part of a god awful plot, the narrative twists and it turns  _

_ if words they are meant to help circumvent confusion then how does it fit  _

_ that i cannot find in the eye of my mind, the spaces in which they should sit  _

 

_ draconis is near in the damn atmosphere to leonis to which it relates  _

_ the river it ends with acamar and then, its twin achernar remains _

_ and all the while, izar runs wild, not meeting a soul like itself  _

_ ‘til a binary star by the surname menkar reveals that it’s out there as well” _

 

**

 

_ threw the window wide and cried, Amen! Amen! Amen! _ __   
_ the whole world stopped to hear you hollering _ __   
  


when we decided to throw open the door we’d been hiding behind there was an agreement that our parents should be the first to know. we felt we owed that at least, as little as we’d shared over the years.

 

my father was an understanding man, one who would hear us out and mull his conclusions for what felt like ages. through my mother’s gasps of shock and yelps of congratulations, he stood still and silent as the statues that had cropped up all over the world, the ones that had always shaken me to my core. (who could see themselves in stone and not feel an unnatural sensation?) 

 

he’d never known that his only son had gotten something past him. hadn’t he paid attention? was he too wrapped up in his career? tears worked their way down his face as he unexpectedly pulled us into his chest. 

 

i did not originally mean to keep things from anyone, but how could you tell something you yourself were only faintly aware of, something that could not be measured. 

 

i warned myself against high hopes, but again they got the best of me. 

 

Draco Malfoy looked at me with new eyes. if you meant something to Scorpius, you meant something to him. badgers thought they had a monopoly on loyalty, but i assure you, slytherin would burn the world down for the ones they loved without first asking why it must be done. 

 

there was something caught in my throat; i found i could not speak. thankfully, conversation was not needed in a time like this as each of us found ourselves lost in the recesses of our thoughts, recontextualising years and years of quiet assumptions. things, to say the least, would be different now.

 

when we announced it out loud, i felt free. our peers could be damned if they didn’t like it, no one could feel what i felt and no one could speak for me, or for him. underneath my anxiety was anticipation. whatever happens, i told him, we have each other, always. 

 

_ the talk in town's becoming downright sickening _ __   
_ in due time we will see the far buttes lit by a flare _ _   
_ __ i’ve seen your bravery, and i will follow you there

 

He was unfazed by the whispers, rumors, and the increasingly invasive questions. Of course, we’d always had the spotlight on us--Him, a Malfoy; me, a Potter. There was something different about this, something sinister. It felt too calculated to be fueled by curiosity. No, this was much more cynical than that. But still, he assured me it’d come and go. We were the hot topic of the moment, but soon there’d be another thing of the now. 

 

I drew strength from his demeanor, always. 

 

As for the good, we were inundated by owl post following our big announcement. While we hadn’t kept up as much as we should have, our friends from school slowly sent their regards, an ongoing ovation. 

 

Snakes had a reputation for conservatism, but it was hardly true of us any longer. We were proof that they could always keep a secret, and protect their own. While there was a general awareness in the dungeons that we both were queer, it was never confirmed that we’d come together. I felt a great warmth in my chest to have the support of those closest to us. I understood why the opinion of strangers mattered so little to him then. 

  
  


_ and i make this claim, and i'm not ashamed to say i know you better _ __   
_ what they've seen is just a beam of your sun that banishes winter _ __   
  


though he kept a brave face through so much of the abuse we endured, it was the magazine article that finally broke him. suddenly, i was he and he was me. i comforted him the best way i knew how--they could write a thousand stories if they’d like, i said. how easy it was to cast us in a disparaging light, how easy it was to believe. 

 

their biggest mistake was signing their names to the piece. 

 

as i said, a slytherin would burn the world down if need be. i do not regret my actions and surely witch weekly could use an editor regardless. i assured him there would be no further write-ups on our personal lives. he kissed me deeply, without hesitation. they’d watch us, always. i didn’t care.

  
  


_ let us go! though we know it's a hopeless endeavor _ _   
_ _ the ties that bind, they are barbed and spined and hold us close forever _

 

We were huddled in our dormitory, contemplating the decision we were about to make. In many ways, we’d already half-made it, considering the deflection it’d take to turn back at that point. Every bit of me was screaming to find a way--I struggled to remember why I’d agreed to this in the first place.

 

“Do you think this is a good idea?” I was alternating between biting my nails and strenuously running my fingers through my hair, both of my nervous tics working overtime. 

 

“We’ll be okay if we do it together. It’ll overwhelm them so much they’ll just accept it,” he grinned. I often wondered how he was able to keep such a calm exterior. 

 

We’d called all of our friends together to turn the whole thing into one big reveal. I knew there was no way I’d be able to go through this more than once. 

 

“What’s up guys?” asked Sebastian. 

 

Charlotte chimed in. “Yeah, what’s the big announcement?” 

 

“Um, yeah.” I started.

 

“Look, we’re both gay. Me and Albus. We wanna date boys.” Scorpius hastily explained the gist of it all and I cringed, eyes closed, prepared for the worst. 

 

For a while, there was nothing. And then--scattered giggles. I opened my eyes and our friends were sat there in various states of glee. 

 

“Was that really all there was to it?” laughed Gabi. 

 

“Yeah, that was the most anticlimactic moment of my life, man.” Sebastian was standing up to leave the Common Room. 

 

Scorpius asked the question on my mind. “What?” 

 

“Oh come off it. You didn’t realise we knew?” Charlotte was in disbelief. 

 

“Didn’t even know you two were meant to be in the closet,” said Gabi. 

 

“Well, that’s great.” I threw my hands in the air, exasperated. 

 

Sebastian seemed legitimately confused. “What do you think we thought about you and Scottie Hopkins, Albus?” 

 

“I dunno. We could have just been friends!” 

 

“All the times we saw you holding hands and you went off together for Hogsmeade and 

everyth—” Charlotte started. 

 

“Okay I get it!” I interrupted. “We weren’t subtle.” 

 

“So you guys are totally cool with it?” Scorpius’ voice trembled. 

 

“Of course!” they said nearly in unison. 

 

Gabi flashed her wide smile. “We’re your best friends, always.” 

  
  


_ landlocked _ __   
_ in bodies that don't keep _ _   
_ __ dumbstruck with the sweetness of being

 

how many different ways could i tell him i love him? i could buy him a book he’d had his eye on without him having to ask, i could lay out his dress robes for him before the ten year reunion i knew he was feeling nervous about, i could serenade him with his favorite song that i spent a week committing to memory. 

 

i could just say i love you. 

 

we had time, there was no rush. the nature of these things is unstable, but i knew we’d rather fall together than stand alone. that much became clear, i could not--would not, live without you. 

 

the snowfall was light, sheathing everything in sight with a picturesque layer of the soft white matter. we wander without aim through the freezing cold dunes, our footprints telling a story. He pulled me onto the ground, both of us making angels side by side. i wouldn’t have asked to be anywhere else but there. 

 

oh, there were no problems to be had there. i couldn’t have let him go if it would’ve saved my life. what life there would be left to live would hold no interest, our worlds were intertwined, always. i chose to be with him and he chose to be with me. things had never been better. 

**Author's Note:**

> Original Author's Note: 
> 
> Well, here’s my challenge entry! Slytherin Albus and Scorpius, also known as my absolute favorite. 
> 
> The lyrics in italics throughout the story and the chapter title are all pulled from the excellent song ‘Emily’ by Joanna Newsom. It’s twelve minutes long and extremely beautiful, in my opinion. 
> 
> As stated in the summary, I alternated between verse/poetry and prose with each section. I am aware that I blur the lines at times. 
> 
> Other than proper nouns, I left everything in the verse sections lowercase for stylization reasons. Those sections mostly consist of me playing a little looser with writing conventions in order to paint the picture slightly differently, so to speak. 
> 
> Scorpius is very into astronomy and Albus’ favorite thing to do is write songs and poems. 
> 
> This all takes place at various points after they’ve graduated from Hogwarts, except for the second to last section, which happens while they attended school in the Slytherin dungeon. 
> 
> I know that the song I wrote about stars is far from one hundred percent correct. I drew inspiration from the song-within-the-song that Joanna Newsom wrote (in the song, Emily that this is based on) in which her narrator incorrectly remembered the functional differences between meteors, meteorites, and meteoroids. 
> 
> More notes on the song - 
> 
> Yes, I did actually set it to a melody and know how to sing it. 
> 
> There is more of it, but I kept in the parts that I thought showed the most personality. There’s a loose narrative to the song and it kind of acts as an allegory, but it makes little to no astronomical sense. 
> 
> Deeply inspired by Laura/Aphoride. She is one of my favorite writers and everyone should read her work. 
> 
> Let me know what you think if you’d like, thank you for reading! 
> 
>  
> 
> ao3 Author's note: Since people seem to enjoy this story I thought I'd bring it here to test the waters. Let me know what you think in a comment.


End file.
